The Queen's Rambles

Life has been crazy the past few days. Our days are on a very tight schedule revolving around sleep and bus pick-up. Elsa’s decided she hates the schedule. Instead of her normal 1 pm nap, she wants to nap at 3. That doesn’t work because I have to pick Erik up from the bus stop at 3:20. ARGH! A 20 minute nap doesn’t cut it.

I end up with a screaming, cranky, no-sleep toddler for the rest of the afternoon. Combine that with a cranky kid (he’s always cranky if I don’t let him spend the whole afternoon watching TV) and you end up with a mother who is ready to run away from home. I need some Zen in my life. Or some ear plugs. But would ear plugs stop them from poking me? I am so tired of sharp little fingers poking me for attention.

I ran away to Kohl’s tonight. I need new pants. I was thinking I needed to size up, but all the sized up jeans were ridiculous clown pants. So that was good for my self-esteem, but it doesn’t help me any on a practical level. My other pants are too tight. Bah. Guess I need to go on a diet. Maybe not bake a bunch of Christmas cookies or pie or fudge. I love chocolatey, pepperminty Christmas goodness . Like a diet will really work at this time of year. I’m going to have to get a mu-mu and call it good. Then I can make up a mu-mu fashion blog and post pictures of myself every day. Did you know people do this? Maybe not with mu-mus, but with other outfits? I find it perplexing. Why do I care what they are wearing? I guess you can blog about anything.

I bought Elsa some new shoes yesterday. There’s a kids shoe store in the mall that always sort of creeped me out because it was dingy looking. I’ve never been in there. I guess I prefer cheap, online shoes that don’t involve talking to an actual person. With Elsa’s extra wide feet I was desperate. I haven’t been able to find a single pair of winter boots that work for her. We may not need winter boots. Maybe there will be no snow. But if we do have snow I know she’s going to want to play in it. Too bad, so sad for her I guess.

But! I really liked the shoe shop and will have to go back. They had a ton of extra wide shoes, so I bought her a pair of good fall shoes. They had more extra wide styles than Zappos, Endless and Shoe Buy combined. And they were nice to talk to. They were family owned, so it’s nice to support small business. Even if that doesn’t jive with my frugal side.

But I still don’t have a winter boot solution. I just heard on the news that it’s going to snow tomorrow. Bah.

I also bought Elsa some new stuff at Gymboree because they were having a great sale and I had a big ole’ coupon. I have a lot of friends who make fun of me for shopping at Gymboree and they always tell me Target is cheaper. I have never seen a $5 pair of seasonally appropriate PJs at Target. The original prices are cheaper than the original Gymborree, but they don’t have sales. And the clothes fall apart. And Gymboree makes clothes that fit a larger frame. Elsa has larger frame issues.

The same friends also make fun of me for making sure Elsa is always wearing cute, matching clothes.

Ummmmmm.

Why wouldn’t I dress my daughter as cute as possible? Ugly clothes cost just as much as cute clothes. Seriously, this one lady had her daughter in a Fair Isle sweater and a pair of tye dyed leggings. And she’s making snarky comments about Elsa wearing a matching outfit? I guess it comes down to jealousy or inferiority or something? Is it just too much effort to find matching clothes? I always put outfits together when I hang the laundry, so I don’t have to put effort into it when I’m dressing her.

Other things that irritate me:

I am so over Erik’s karate class. It’s a huge money pit. HUGE> They are instituting new uniforms and a new curriculum after the new year. It’s over $200 for a new uniform and equipment. How in the bleepity bleeping hell does a karate uniform cost over $100? That’s some crazy ass mark-up.

Now that he’s in the 6 years-adult class, it’s a lot of work and very little fun. I guess adults and teens don’t want to play obstacle course or “Ninja, Ninja, Dragon.” He hates it. The fun has been sucked out of it. He cries and screams when it’s time to go. I have to entertain Elsa and keep her quiet while we’re there. It’s a bleepity bleepin’ nightmare. I think Mike needs to go inand ask for a refund. Isn’t it nice of me to throw Mike under the six degree black belt bus? Even if we lose the money, it still might be worth it to cut our losses now. Do I really want to have two rotten nights each week because of this stupid money pit class?

I also hate it because they don’t correct the students. The teacher stands up front and does the moves or watches and shouts out what they are supposed to do, but no one comes by and tells the kids when they are using the wrong hand or kicking in the wrong direction. Drives. Me. CRAZY. They are doing this sword dance routine that is super cool when the black belts do it, but not super cool when Erik does it. He doesn’t understand how to position his hands, he won’t listen to me, and no one will walk over and SHOW HIM. It would take them a minute. How can they stand there and watch him struggle so badly and not do anything about it? I fume when I go to the classes.

Something happy:

Mike’s company has their holiday party next week. I found a babysitter on Craigslist. I hope I’m not stupid to be using a craigslist sitter, but that’s the way I usually find sitters. We met her at the mall this weekend and she seems normal. She’s single, 27, and has a full time job. I hope that means she doesn’t have time to fantasize about playing mommy with children that she kidnaps from her babysitting jobs. I’ll take her picture and a picture of her car when we leave. She did well with Erik and didn’t push into Elsa’s face, so that was good. I hope this works because it would be nice to have an occasional evening out. I don’t know how she will do with Elsa wanting to sleep on her lap. She’s making enough money that she should be able to deal with it. I really want to switch out the crib to the toddler bed and teach Elsa to sleep there. Dreams. . . .

Currently the crib is filled with cloth diapers. What am I supposed to do with them all? It makes me mad to look at them, knowing that every time I don’t use one I’m just costing myself money. But what do you do when a very strong willed toddler refuses to wear them?

I’m going to go through all the gender neutral ones and send them to Jenn, but I will still have a whole stash of girly ones that I need to get rid of. I am tempted to just give them all away, but that would be really stupid. I guess I need to start cleaning them all up and start listing them on Craigslist. I have about 15 large FuzziBunz that have been used less than five times each :-(. So much for cloth diapering being so great for baby. Since we’ve stopped using them, we’ve gotten rid of all Elsa’s diaper rash issues.

And now it’s time for bed. I hope I can sleep tonight. I often have recurring dreams about tigers and lions chasing me and trapping me in the house. The latest Castle episode was somewhat related to that nightmare. Just thinking about it again is making my heart rate go up. No nightmares, brain, pretty please?